


Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall

by FoxCollector



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Realities, Gen, I hope this is scary, M/M, Mirror Worlds - Freeform, accidentally mixed them together a bit here, author has two settings: smut and horror, background relationship drama, being hunted by a scary monster lady, modern au: bakery, sappy relationship stuff at the end, scary monster lady, uhh but that's not the focus the focus is a kind of ghost story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-01
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:21:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24718945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FoxCollector/pseuds/FoxCollector
Summary: The first time it happens, Jon only really notices because he happens to like the song that was playing.By the third time it happens, Jon is starting to think maybe it’s a glitch in the system. The bakery is old, after all.---There's something wrong with the sound system at the bakery, and that's fine, until it isn't just the sound system that's wrong. It's a good thing for Jon he isn't alone when it happens, or he probably wouldn't make it out.
Relationships: Jon Snow & Edd Tollett, Jon Snow & Samwell Tarly, Tormund Giantsbane/Jon Snow
Comments: 3
Kudos: 21





	Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall

**Author's Note:**

> I arrive overly late to a fandom with a semi-rare pair to contribute a ghost story in bizarre fashion. 
> 
> Look, this is terribly self-indulgent, I love horror, and I don't think anyone will read this, but I'm posting it all the same. I'm also concurrently writing a Tormund/Jon fic so that sort of seeped into this one and wound up being a background bit? I'm not going to complain about that. 
> 
> These are clearly the show versions of the characters, I have only recently started reading the novels, so yeah.
> 
> Most of the shipping stuff is at the end, aside from a mention or two in the middle, so I don't know, if you're here for that you can skip down I guess?
> 
> Thank you for reading! <3
> 
> (See the notes at the bottom for the songs mentioned in the story; get some nice (creepy) atmosphere in there)

The first time it happens, Jon only really notices because he likes the song that was playing.

It’s late, and the bakery is closed now. The sun had gone down hours before in the early winter afternoon, and half of the lights in the shop are out. Jon has learned from experience that that is the only real way to communicate that they are really and truly closed.

He and Sam are almost done cleaning up for the day; the counters and tables are wiped, the floors swept, all the foods packaged and put away.

Jon is only just mopping the floor, and then they will have to go up to the main office and turn off the music and the few lights not accessible downstairs, then lock up and head home.

As much as he hates the pre-set music that constantly blares over the bakery’s speakers – you can only hear the same songs so many times without getting tired of them – he hasn’t gotten tired of this one yet, and there’s no one there to judge him for it. Well, maybe Sam is there, but he doesn’t judge Jon for anything, which is nice.

It comes just around the middle of the song, there’s a click, like someone has changed a radio station, and then there’s another song playing entirely. It goes from an upbeat _Don’t take me tongue tied_ to a sudden low crooning voice, _And the sun will never shine out as brightly, my heart longs to be free_ and then as suddenly as it had happened, it flips back.

It makes him pause and he looks around, trying to spot Sam to see if he had heard it too. He’s completely alone, and he has the brief, irrational, thought that Sam is far away and wouldn’t make it back in time. He shakes his head to clear the thought. It doesn’t make sense. There was a glitch on the track. Or something. He goes back to mopping, frowning at the floor. It has no answers.

The back door clangs open and Jon jumps.

“It’s snowing out there,” Sam says, coming back around the corner. And sure enough there’s fresh snow melting on his shoulders.

Jon glances out the window to watch the fresh snow coming down from the night sky.

Sam steps out, and Jon levels a finger at him. “Don’t mess up the floor.”

Sam just grins and wipes his feet on the mat leading through to the kitchen.

After a moment, Jon clears his throat. “You were outside?”

“Taking out the garbage,” Sam says. He pushes the mop bucket closer to Jon with his foot.

“There was this weird glitch in the soundtrack,” Jon says, trying for conversational.

Sam wrinkles his nose. “Did it skip?”

“It kind of cut out? There was another song playing.” Jon drops the mop back into the water, and then up to drain it. “An old song I haven’t heard before. It was …strange.”

“That is weird,” Sam agrees cheerfully.

He waits patiently for Jon to finish his mopping and put away the equipment in the back. Sam won’t go to the upstairs office alone. Not many of them will – Edd will if he has to, but even he prefers not to. Jon did once. He decided he didn’t like the open space, or the dark supply room at the back.

It was just a personal preference, that was all. No one judged anyone else for it, it was a silent agreement that you did not go upstairs by yourself if you didn’t want to. You waited for your shift-mate, and the two of you went up to the office, shut down everything else, signed out, and then left at the same time.

Jon leads the way up the stairs, feeling along the wall in the dark. The wall is soft under his fingertips, and he has the brief thought that he is petting something. He snatches his hand back.

The door to the upstairs office is always open a crack. It tends to stick if it is closed all the way, and so Jon only has to tap it open. He reaches along the wall to flick on the lights and flood the space with dim orange light. The small room at the back stays dark, a pocket of shadow. He moves to the right, to the stereo control system, flicking the three switches down, and turning the dial back. Sam has gone to the back, next to the open darkness to turn the furnace off. They meet back at the light switches.

“Flashlight?” Sam asks.

Jon pulls out his phone and activates the flashlight.

Sam hits the lights and they go out with an echoing click. There’s a chill in the air, and Jon lifts his light so they can find their back down. He hates going down in the dark, he always thinks he’s going to fall down the stairs. At least the fall wouldn’t kill him, he supposes. Sam has fumbled out his own light, and Jon motions for him to go down first. In spite of that, there’s still the familiar sensation of something behind him.

They sign out, grab their coats, lock up, and head home. And that should have been the end of it. Just one more night closing, when closing has always been his least favourite shift. It’s different in the mornings. He doesn’t know why, it just is.

The second time it happens, Jon isn’t alone.

It’s late in the day, maybe an hour to closing. There are no customers, and Jon has started idly tidying up the back counter. Edd is looking over the schedule. He does that a lot, for whatever reason. It hasn’t changed since he last looked at it, Jon knows. Maybe Edd is just memorizing everybody else’s shifts. It doesn’t really matter.

Jon doesn’t quite notice at first. He registers that one song has ended, because he _hates_ that song and he is _this_ close to begging Mormont to take it off the list, but he doesn’t quite register that the song starting now isn’t one he knows. There’s a gentle piano, and something soft. It’s only when the singing starts that he notices.

 _The memory of you_ – in a woman’s voice he doesn’t recognize. He straightens, turning around. Edd looks over at him, brows furrowed. Jon shivers, suddenly chilled as though a customer has left the door standing open.

“New song?” Edd asks.

And then it skips, and Eddie Money’s “Take Me Home Tonight” is playing.

Edd frowns, and Jon knows he’s making a similar face.

“That was weird,” Edd says. “Never had that happen before.”

“I have,” Jon says. “Just once. Same song though, I think.”

Edd shrugs. “Ghosts.” He wiggles his eyebrows.

Jon scowls at him. Still, it is nice to know that someone else heard it too. Makes him feel a little less creeped out. And Edd’s nonchalance makes him feel better about it. If Edd isn’t worried, then it’s probably fine.

They close up, and it’s colder than usual, but then, it’s getting colder outside too. Edd lets him go down the stairs first, so this time when he feels like there’s something waiting behind him, he tells himself it’s only Edd.

By the third time it happens, Jon is starting to think maybe it’s just a glitch in the sound system. Not that it ever happens during the same song.

He knows the bakery is old. It was built and opened in the 30’s, and not much beyond the ownership has changed since then. Well, the ownership and the equipment in the back. Edd had told him once that the old ovens didn’t have a handle on the inside, so if you were dumb enough to walk in there you could get locked in. He also liked to tell all the new hires that the handprints on the back wall of the oven were from the person they were hired to replace. Jon was pretty sure they were just from a repairman at some point. Although it did beg the question as to why the marks never went away. He didn’t know, he didn’t know much about ovens at all and that was fine.

He’s only just closed and locked the front door, turning the sign around. He still has to clean everything, and sweep and mop and take out the garbage. And then when he gets home he has to take Ghost out and remember to leave his keys on the table for Theon to use the car tomorrow morning. He’s already tired. It was a busy day, and as much as he loves Sam, the man has one pace, and it is _slow_.

Sam is clearing off the counters in the back, and Jon goes to get a pail of sanitizing solution for the tables.

They work in silence, mostly. Occasionally Sam hums along to whatever is still playing over the speakers, and once or twice he stops working to tell Jon something about Gilly that Jon doesn’t think he needs to know. They finish sweeping and head to the back, Jon gets the mop bucket and fills it, and Sam heads outside with the cardboard and garbage.

It’s when Jon has pulled the bucket into the lobby and Sam is still outside that he hears the song again. It’s just beginning, and he wonders how long it will play before it cuts out this time. It does sound like something from the 40’s or 50’s. Maybe it played often in the bakeshop’s early days. It plays through the first opening bars, the first words. And it keeps playing.

He pauses in his cleaning, listening.

There’s a slow creak behind him, a hushing sound.

He glances back over his shoulder, but he’s alone. Sam must be breaking the boxes down before he tosses them.

The song is still playing though. It’s pretty, but there’s something melancholic about it, and Jon decides he doesn’t like it.

The light by the kitchen doorway flickers out. Jon frowns at that. Lightbulb must have burnt out, he decides. Strange timing, but it happens. A chill crawls up his spine, though he can hear the furnace going.

He has the sudden thought that he is too exposed, standing in the middle of the shop, half-bent over the mop as he scrubs at a spot. He glances out the windows, but the streets are empty, obscured in a light winter fog. There’s a blue cast to the streetlights outside, catching on the white and making the world shimmer. He doesn’t think that’s quite usual, but it could be anything.

The mop pulls off the floor, sticking like it’s been frosted into place, and he glances back towards the kitchens. “Sam?”

There’s no answer.

Jon frowns.

The lights along the front of the shop flicker out in a row. If Sam is trying to prank him he’s going to be pissed.

“Sam?” He tries again, a little louder. He puts the mop back in the bucket and makes his way to the back.

Sam isn’t there. The back door is shut, the bolt slid over. So Sam isn’t still outside then. He wouldn’t – couldn’t – lock himself out. But he isn’t in the kitchen at all, or the small manager’s office.

The lights behind the counter flick out, and that makes Jon’s breath catch. Those lights are controlled by the switches in the upstairs office. Sam wouldn’t go up there alone. He looks up the dark stairway, weighing his options. On the one hand, that’s the one of the only places Sam could be. On the other hand, it’s the one place he is guaranteed not to be.

Or then, maybe the bathroom?

Yes. He makes his way to the staff rooms at the back. Above him, the song is still going, and Jon wonders if it’s a long song, or if maybe he’s just losing perception of time. It could even have looped. He probably wouldn’t notice.

The staff room lights are out too, and Jon reaches for his phone. It’s cold now, and he wraps one arm around himself. By the light of his phone he checks the small room. Empty.

“Sam!” He calls, a little frustrated now.

There’s a creak from behind the counter out front, and Jon pauses. He goes back out to the front of the shop. His breath comes out in a small gust of steam, and goose bumps stand out on his arms. He shudders. It’s colder out here than it was in the back. He goes to the corner where he’d heard the creaking, the floor bending beneath his feet and creaking under his own steps. There was no mistaking that noise.

There’s a slight mist spreading across the floor, and Jon thinks that someone must have let it in, but that’s a strange thought. That’s not how mist works.

He opens his mouth to call out again, and has the sudden feeling that he shouldn’t. He doesn’t know where it comes from, but it comes unbidden that he should be quiet.

He has the feeling he isn’t alone. He _shouldn’t_ be alone, Sam should be here. But it isn’t Sam. It reminds him more of the feeling he gets when he can’t see what’s behind him.

The stereo is still playing, and this time he hears the song loop. He catches movement in the corner of his eye, and glances at the shop window. There’s a shape there, tall and thin, stooped slightly. Much too tall and thin to be Sam.

For a moment he thinks there’s something outside the window, waiting to come in, or for him to come out. He ducks down slightly; he doesn’t like the idea of it seeing him. And he watches it turn and drift strangely.

Oh, he realizes. It’s not through the window.

It isn’t outside. That’s a reflection.

Which means it’s inside with him.

His breath catches.

The song grows louder and then abruptly cuts out. It makes him jump.

Now he can hear something else. There’s a vague tuneless humming and a burst of static. Jon fumbles his phone and turns the flashlight off, sliding lower behind the counter. Whatever this is, he has a bad feeling about it.

Every instinct in his body is telling him to run, to get away, and he has no idea why, what it is he’s supposed to run from. But the feeling he gets from the thing that slowly drifts from the back unfurls in his stomach and licks up his spine. It’s pure terror.

He chokes on a breath and brings his hand up to his mouth.

Where is Sam?

Did something happen to him?

What if that thing did something to him and now it was coming for Jon?

He swallows hard. _Calm down_ , he tells himself. Think about this. If this were his father or Robb here, they would try to get a look at what was coming, to assess the situation properly. Panic won’t help anything. It never does.

Still, his instincts haven’t led him astray yet, and he won’t start fighting them now. He’ll stay out of sight.

He inches forward, and sees a tall woman drifting aimlessly across the front of the store. He assumes it’s a woman, anyway. The hair is long, falling in tendrils in front of her face and writhing in the air on a breeze Jon doesn’t feel. She’s stooped, spine protruding in knobs down her back, exposed in the gap of a loose hospital style gown. There’s something indistinct about her, as though Jon is looking at her through the surface of a rippling lake. But the sound of her dragging steps on the floor is clear enough.

There’s a chill on the air that seems to rise as she staggers on long, bent legs, growing a little closer to the counter. Her humming is interrupted by intermittent heaving groans, and the sound makes his hair stand on end.

Jon slides back a bit farther, and she wanders away. He can’t tell if she’s looking for something or just wandering around, but he’d rather not take his chances. Her long arms end in crooked fingers tipped with bent nails and when she straightens as though to sniff the air, the top of her head nearly brushes the ceiling.

No, Jon’s not sure he could win that fight.

He stays low to the ground, nearly crawling as he makes his way toward the back room. He can hear her steps coming back around and he freezes. If he wants to make it to the back door, he’ll have to cross the open space between the counter and the kitchen. If she sees him, he probably won’t make it to the back. The bakery isn’t big enough for that. For a moment he imagines the way her nails would sink into his skin.

No, definitely not.

He leans slightly around the corner of the counter and spots her coming back around towards the kitchen. For a horrible moment, he sees her face, or what passes for a face. Her eyes sit small in hollow sockets, and her mouth opens nearly ear to ear like a doll with a hinged jaw. The glint of several rows of small teeth catches in the blue light that seems to emanate from nowhere and everywhere, and Jon slides further back out of sight. He’s pretty sure she didn’t see him. He doesn’t know what he’d do if she did. He isn’t even close to the knife drawer. He doesn’t even have a spatula to work with.

He listens to her steps, hoping very much she won’t come around this way. Her voice moves off, and he heaves a sigh in relief, until he realizes that she’s moved into the kitchen, where he needs to go.

He moves to the doorway, and leans around the side. From here he can see her steady path as she drifts toward the far end. So he won’t be going through that door then, which is okay, because the supply room door is closer.

She stops at the far side, swaying softly as she raises her head, and Jon thinks again that maybe she’s sniffing the air. Still, with her momentary distraction, he slides through to the baker’s table in the middle of the room, and tucks under it.

There’s a hollow sound, something between a shriek of delight and a pained moan, and he hears her stumble across the room. Either she saw him and he’s fucked, or she really can smell him and he’s fucked. Not great options.

He watches as her feet come closer to the table, and then stagger past it through to the front. So maybe she only sensed him then? Or maybe she heard something somewhere else? He doesn’t know, and at the moment he doesn’t care, although something in the back of his mind that sounds like his younger sister tells him he should care very much. Still, he takes the opportunity to slide out, watching the doorway. There’s nothing there.

He slips across to the supply room. The door is still locked ahead of him, but that’s fine, it won’t take a moment –

There’s a noise like a kettle letting off steam, and it takes Jon a second to realize it was a pleased sounding whistle.

Well. Fuck.

He doesn’t turn back to look, he knows he doesn’t have the time for that, instead he breaks into a run, nearly colliding with the door. Behind him there are rapid uneven footsteps and hissing breaths. Her arms are long, and he expects to feel her hands close on him at any moment. He fumbles the lock, barely managing to slide the bolt across and falls against it to shove it open.

There’s a muffled cry he doesn’t pay attention to when the door bangs open, only turns back to shove the door closed, to put something, _anything,_ between himself and whatever that is. He hauls the door back, and in the instant before he slams it shut he sees her closing in, hands outstretched in a grasping motion.

He hears her nails scrabbling against the door as he leans hard on it, keeping it shut with his body.

He honestly hadn’t been sure that would work. He’d half thought she might just phase through the door like a ghost and keep coming, after all, she’d walked right through a table earlier. He’s not sure how much he likes the idea of her as a physical being though.

“Jon?” A small voice says.

He startles and looks around, spotting Sam hauling himself up from the ground in the dim blue light.

“Sam!” Jon reaches for him, keeping to the door as much as possible, and clasps his arms. “Where were you?”

“I was outside with the cardboard,” Sam says. “And when I tried to go back in, the door was locked. I thought maybe you were putting me on.”

Jon frowns. “I wouldn’t do that.”

“I know,” Sam says. Then, a little quieter he says, “Thought maybe you were angry with me.”

“Sam,” Jon says, exasperatedly fond and on the verge of hysterics. “I didn’t lock the door.”

Behind him, he realizes, the door has stopped jolting and he can no longer hear her hissing groans.

“Are you okay?” Sam asks, looking Jon over.

“I think so, now.” Jon takes a breath. “Did you see -?” He isn’t sure how to finish that sentence.

“I saw you bolt out the door. Didn’t see much more than that, except the door in my face,” Sam says. “I did see it moving though. Is there someone in there? Should we call the police?”

Jon laughs, and it sounds a little manic with relief. He feels soaked to the skin and he’s freezing cold. Had he been sweating?

“No, I don’t think the police would do much,” Jon says. He pulls out his phone again anyway, half intending to send a message to Sansa, tell her he’s going to be late, trying for a sense of normalcy.

Sam frowns at him. “Okay. Do we go back inside?”

Jon raises a hand to his chest. “I suppose we have to. Just give me a minute.” His phone has no signal. He frowns at it, trying to play with the settings. No wi-fi. No data. No signal. He raises the phone, as though he’s in a basement and might reach a signal if he moves up.

“What are you doing?” Sam asks.

“I’ve got no signal,” Jon says.

Sam pulls out his phone. “Me neither.”

Not good. Jon had half thought that maybe his phone had been screwed up just from being in proximity to that thing, but if Sam’s phone isn’t working, then he has no explanation.

“Bit nippy isn’t it?” Sam’s teeth chatter.

“Yeah.” Jon rubs at his arms. Has it gotten colder?

“Let’s go back in,” Sam says. He gently moves Jon aside and hauls on the door.

It won’t open.

“Oh, not again!” Sam grunts, pulling on the handle.

Jon’s breath catches. He reaches out to help Sam tug on the door. It’s stuck good, as though it’s been welded in place rather than simply bolted shut. It won’t budge at all.

“Sam,” Jon says.

Sam stops. “Are you sure there’s not someone in there?”

“There’s some _thing_ in there. I don’t think it wants us going back in,” Jon says. “We should go. We can come back later.”

Sam glances between Jon and the door. “Okay,” he says cautiously. “Where are we going?”

“I don’t know,” Jon says. “Just… away.”

He wraps his arms around himself and backs away. There’s a cold mist curling around his ankles, and he glances down at it half-heartedly.

“Maybe we can go to the corner store,” Sam says. “That blond guy you like is working tonight.”

“I don’t _like_ him,” Jon says. He opens his mouth to tell Sam he’s already seeing someone, has been for the past few weeks, but it dies on his tongue. “He’s just…nice.”

He frowns at himself. He doesn’t know why he can’t bring himself to say anything. It’s _Sam_ , Sam would only want to know he’s happy.

Jon keeps his mouth shut.

“Well, I bet he’d be happy to help us,” Sam says.

“Fine,” Jon says. If only because he doesn’t want to stay here. He’s starting to feel as though they aren’t entirely alone, and he wonders briefly if maybe she was only playing with him, if maybe she could get through the door and is biding her time and listening in, or if maybe she’s simply found another exit to slither out of and is lying in wait for them. He doesn’t like that thought.

They start off through the back alley, and in the blue tinted light it looks like another world entirely. The snow on the ground looks like ash heaped along the walls, and the pools of ice are red-purple stains on the pavement.

They turn the corner and Jon pauses. Somehow it seems as though they’re on the wrong side of the street. It’s an odd feeling, when they are still across from the same houses on one side, and the book shop, and corner store on the others. But it all seems… backwards. He is also now realizing that to get to the store across the street at the far corner, they will have to pass in front of the large glass windows of the bakery.

“What?” Sam asks.

Jon shakes his head, and glances around. Aside from those stores, there’s just houses around them, and he doesn’t want to go to anyone’s door at this hour. He doesn’t know any of them that well. Not that it’s all that late.

Jon starts again, slowly.

“Pretty dead outside,” Sam says conversationally. “Guess people decided on an early night.”

Jon wishes that was true, but he has a feeling it’s not. “We should probably hurry,” he says, although he’s not sure that will make a difference.

He watches the window on the bakeshop as they come around in front of it. He can barely see inside, but he can make out just enough to see that it’s empty.

That’s good. Or maybe it isn’t. He glances around the street, and there’s nothing there either. As much as he’s relieved to see that it’s – that _she_ ’s – gone, he’s also uneasy. It doesn’t _feel_ like she’s gone. It feels like she’s close enough to watch them, and he doesn’t like that he can’t see her.

“What are you looking for?” Sam asks, and Jon realizes he’s been staring.

“I saw something. Inside.” Jon looks up the street towards the corner store. The lights are on, but there’s a blue cast to them that makes him doubt they’ll find help in there.

“You said that. What was it?” Sam asks.

“I don’t know. A woman. Or a… A monster.” It sounds funny to say that, and he flushes, feeling foolish.

“Don’t like that,” Sam says. And he at least doesn’t laugh at Jon.

They pass the bakeshop front quickly. The corner store is just up ahead now. It’s quiet outside, muffled in a way that makes Jon feel surrounded in the emptiness.

His skin prickles in the cold air, and he’s suddenly chilled again, although he’s not sure when or if he felt warmer at all. His breath mists out in front of him.

There’s a burst of static and a high buzzing noise. In the distance there’s a low wail. It reminds him of the time they went to the beach and his stepmother had taught his brothers how to blow on conch shells. It’s out of place here, in the cold, and it almost distracts Jon from the sound of footsteps dragging behind them.

“What is that, do you think?” Sam asks, rubbing at his arms.

Jon makes a shushing sound, and he grabs Sam by the elbow, pulling him on something more than instinct. For an instant, he starts the wrong way, it should be to the left to get in by the shops and behind the large old mailboxes, and he has to stop and make himself go around to the right. They’re still across the street from the store, the only building around them with any lights at all, but for now they’re out of sight.

He crouches down in the darkness, and Sam follows suit.

He hears the humming, that low discordant sound, and he can hear it moving closer. If he listens hard enough it almost seems to resemble the song that had been playing, though it doesn’t sound quite right. She steps out from the corner, wandering in a not-so-straight line towards the corner store.

Sam gasps, muffling it behind his hands, and Jon recoils, momentarily afraid she’s heard them. She doesn’t react, which would be good if she weren’t heading for the same place as them.

Jon pulls back a little farther, looking up behind them as he goes. They’re going to have to find another way there. Or find somewhere else to go. Around the edges of the intersection is darkness, and Jon has the strangest idea that those form the limits of the world and to go beyond the light would be to fall into nothingness. It’s a claustrophobic feeling, and the idea of being trapped in a small space with that woman – that no matter how far they try to go they can never truly escape her – sets his teeth on edge and makes panic fray the edges of his mind.

Sam shudders next to him. “What if she comes back this way?”

And Jon realizes if they don’t move they’ll quickly run out of options. “Right.” He stands slowly, and together they move off, to behind the bookshop across from the corner store. He feels wrongfooted every step of the way, like he’s headed in the wrong direction and about to walk into trouble.

Her humming gets louder, and Jon hopes they haven’t made a terrible mistake. But she drifts past, only barely missing them as she doubles back, just as Sam worried she would.

He hadn’t noticed it before, but her voice is strange. It sounds more like many voices overlaid into one, and not all of them humming, some whispering and others sighing. No wonder she couldn’t hold a tune.

“I don’t think there’s anyone in there, Sam,” Jon says, motioning to the store.

“Well, we have to try, don’t we?” Sam asks, and Jon notices the edge of desperation on his voice.

“And if there’s no one?” Jon asks, because he has to.

“Then we…” Sam falters. “We run for it.”

That sounds like a terrible idea. Jon’s mouth twists. “Worth a shot.”

They stay low, and Jon tries to keep an eye on the woman wandering the street. He knows she’ll turn back eventually, whether she’s actively patrolling the area or only wandering, she will eventually find them if they don’t keep moving.

He has a sick feeling in his gut that she knows where they are at all times, and is only toying with them, but he tells himself that isn’t true. It can’t be, there’s no reason to toy with them this long. Right?

The door to the store is out in the open, and Jon is sure she’ll turn back and see them as they approach it. Sam reaches out tentatively and falters, hands curling in on themselves. Jon swallows hard and reaches past him to open the door. The bell above the door rings, and they both turn their heads quickly, trying to see if she’s been alerted by the noise.

The street is empty.

Jon holds his breath, listening. He definitely liked it better when he knew where she was. Now, she could be anywhere. He catches Sam’s eye and Sam tilts his head towards the store. May as well go inside anyway.

It’s deserted, and Jon knew it would be, but Sam lets out a frustrated sigh.

The lights that had seemed to shine so invitingly through the window went out when the door opened, and now there’s only that odd blue light filtering in through the windows. It’s a cold light, unnatural and dead, and it never seems to have any source, but right now it’s all they have to see by.

“What now?” Jon asks. “You want to try the phone? There’s no one here, Sam. There’s no one anywhere.”

Sam shrugs weakly. “It couldn’t hurt.”

Jon huffs, and makes his way up to the counter, backwards to how he usually goes. Passing through the shelves, something strikes him as odd, though he can’t quite place it. It seems like everything is as it should be, barring the obvious.

It looks like a shop in the dark. But something doesn’t sit right; the air is full of something like decay, and he has a feeling he shouldn’t really touch anything in there. Maybe the food on the shelves is rotten. Maybe it isn’t food at all. That’s a strange and unhelpful thought, Jon decides, and shelves it.

The front counter, where Bjorn should be working, is empty, and Jon reaches past from the customer’s side to where he knows the phone is. It’s only when his arm is extended out into the empty space that he thinks maybe he shouldn’t have done that, that something will grab him, but it doesn’t. He picks up the phone and holds it to his ear.

Static, hissing and sputtering like an angry animal.

He looks over at Sam. “Nothing.”

Still, he reaches back to hit a few of the buttons on the base, and he can see by the dim light that the numbers are backwards. He can’t even tell if anything has happened, there’s no sound beyond his fingers on the buttons and the static. He dials Robb’s number, one of the few he actually remembers without checking his own phone, and still there’s nothing.

Well – no.

Not quite nothing.

Sam is at his shoulder. “Let me –”

Jon shushes him impatiently. There’s a distant sound through the receiver, and it makes him think that’s what a phone ringing would sound like muffled underwater. He furrows his brow. If he listens close enough, he almost thinks he can hear a voice in the distance.

“Hello?” Jon says.

There’s a violent burst of static from the phone, and he drops it. It clatters on the counter, the noise unbearably loud in the closed shop. Sam jumps, hands scrabbling for the phone and then placing it none-too-gently on the base.

“I think everyone heard that,” Sam says quietly. “We should probably hide.”

“Sorry,” Jon whispers.

They skirt around to the darkness on the other side of the counter, listening intently.

From somewhere nearby, Jon can make out dragging steps, and the alternating humming and groaning of the woman. Great.

She sounds muffled, and Jon supposes she must be just outside the building, but he can’t quite tell where. He really hopes he didn’t get her attention with that. He didn’t mean to drop it; he was just startled. Gods, he can be so dumb.

Sam tugs on his sleeve and Jon shakes off his grip, trying to pinpoint her location based on her voice, trying to hear if she’s coming closer.

Sam tugs again, insistently.

“What?” Jon hisses, turning to look at him.

“Look at that!” Sam points up to the far corner of the shop.

There’s one of those curved surveillance type mirrors in the corner, and when Jon sees it, he starts. The image reflected in the mirror is not at all the store they are in now. He doesn’t know how he didn’t see it before.

The mirror is bright, the colour of industrial orange lights, and the image it shows is a store in late-night business.

There are people there.

There’s a man that he’s pretty sure is Davos staring intently at the aisle Jon knows is full of candy bars as though it’s a life or death decision. There’s a woman and a little girl looking at bolt cutters. And Bjorn is at the counter, roughly right behind where Jon is.

He’s suddenly hyper-aware of the space behind him and how empty it is.

“What in the –” Jon breaks off. The store around him is empty and chilled and dark. The store reflected is bright, warm with a late-night group of customers picking up some last minute supplies.

It makes Jon’s stomach drop. How is he supposed to get _there_? How is it that he can be _here_? Where is here? How can he be in the middle of the store and yet completely separate from the people there?

He feels as though he’s been peeled off from reality, stuck to some excess layer like a fly on a piece of tape. Is there even a way to get back? Will he and Sam be reported missing and never found? His father would never know what happened to him. It would break his heart. And his siblings would wonder. They wouldn’t even know he was gone until Theon found Jon hadn’t come home when he went to take the car. Arya would be devastated. Robb would want to know – he would drive himself mad trying to figure out what happened. And what would Gilly do without Sam to help support her and her baby? What would Tormund do? No one even knew Jon was seeing him, would he have to tell Jon’s family? Would he have to deal with it in silence?

Jon is spiraling, he knows, and he makes himself take a deep breath. His blood is pounding in his ears, and Sam has been whispering, saying something that he’s missed entirely.

He clears his throat. “What?”

Sam looks him over. He places a hand on Jon’s shoulder. “Um. I just. I said, in summary, maybe we’re in a mirror world. Maybe we can get back through a mirror.”

Jon snorts. It sounds, objectively, ridiculous. “What mirror, Sam? We can’t even reach that one up there. Mirrors aren’t doorways.”

“Not all mirrors,” Sam says. He goes thoughtful. “Where did this start?”

“In the bakery?” Jon says.

“It was only when you came outside that things got weird for me. I was just locked out before,” Sam says.

Jon frowns. That meant it had started inside, and he’d let it out. “So, what, we have to go back to the bakery? Just one problem with that. I don’t think she wants us to go back in there. And what would we do there anyway? How can we get back?”

“Well that’s why she doesn’t want us to go back then,” Sam says. “Because we’ll get away from her.” He looks proud of himself.

Jon raises an eyebrow. “Great.” He chews his lip.

“Hang on,” Jon says. It tends to work better when he processes out loud. “Before, I didn’t think about it, but there was a song playing I didn’t know. I never went up to check, but. Maybe there’s something up there? It’s the only place in the bakery something like that…” he’s not sure how to finish that sentence. He doesn’t want to say that the woman waiting for them outside would belong in the room upstairs, but she would certainly seem more at home there. And he couldn’t say it wasn’t where she’d come from. He hadn’t gone up to check. He hadn’t wanted to.

“There’s a mirror upstairs,” Sam says. “In the office.”

“No there isn’t,” Jon says, mildly confused. He’s been up there plenty of times. He’s pretty sure he would have noticed.

“Yes, there is,” Sam insists. “It’s in the back room, it’s on a table, all covered up with a sheet. Edd and I found it one time when the sheet came off it. He said it was an ugly old fucker of a mirror and he covered it right back up.”

That does sound like Edd.

Jon opens his mouth, and then closes it again. Well, he can’t really argue with that. He’s never gone into that back room. “Okay. I guess there isn’t much else we can do.” If it doesn’t work, though…

“Not really,” Sam agrees.

Jon looks back up at the mirror, at the normalcy of it all. He’d very much like to be back there. He turns back to Sam. “We go slow, and quiet.”

Sam nods.

In a way that Jon imagines looks terribly ungraceful, perhaps even outright clumsy, he crawls out from behind the counter, Sam at his heels, and stands cautiously.

The store is empty.

He listens closely.

Step. Step. Shuffle. A whining noise and a groan.

The sounds are muffled by the walls of the building, but she still sounds close.

Jon creeps closer to the wide shop windows and leans in to check up and down the street.

For a moment, he thinks the coast is clear, and then he realizes that the blur of darkness to the far right is her.

His breath catches. She isn’t facing him though, and he quickly loses sight of her when she seems to walk right into a wall.

Sam crowds up against him, trying to see, and Jon has to push him off so he can move.

“I can’t see her,” Sam whispers loudly.

“Me neither,” Jon says.

“Should we go?”

There’s a clattering noise from somewhere in the back, and then a bursting noise, and the song cuts in on the middle of a long note, blaring overly loud on the speakers of the small store. Jon has the sudden thought that she’s gone right through the wall at the back of the shop and is making her way towards them. He hadn’t thought she could go through walls, but what does he know about that really? Only what she lets him know.

“I think we’d better,” Jon says, trying to be heard over the noise but not to be so loud as to draw unwanted attention.

And they nearly crash into each other as they both go for the door at the same time.

They slip out into the street, Jon following Sam, and he closes the door softly behind them.

 _Okay_ , he tells himself. _This is easy. All we have to do is cross the street again. Get back inside. Go upstairs. Go through a mirror? Easy._

_What if it doesn’t work?_ A treacherous voice in the back of his head whispers.

No. He can’t think about that. If it doesn’t work, then he imagines they won’t be around much longer. He has a feeling her patience will grow short when she realizes what they’re trying to do.

Outside, the fog has crept in, and Jon can’t see the pavement beneath his feet at all anymore. It’s a dense fog, suffocating, and when he starts to walk it feels a bit like he’s wading through water. His legs are chilled with the condensation, and unbidden he thinks that it’s like the fog has started to digest them. He shudders involuntarily and starts across the street.

It’s a bright fog, and as much as it makes it easier to see, it makes him feel uncomfortably visible.

They’re across the street, in the same small shelter around the corner when Jon realizes they’re being watched.

He glances back towards the corner store, expecting her to be there in the window, or perhaps even right behind them. But there’s nothing there. He notices for the first time that the name on the store is entirely reversed, and if he didn’t know it was supposed to say ‘Lothbrok & Sons’ he wouldn’t be able to read it all.

He turns back around again, confused, and then he spots it; something lying in the street behind their so-called safe hiding spot. It looks human, or maybe it used to be human, but the ruin of a face staring out at them is a picture of agony. Lying prone in the street, limbs pulled wide and, from what Jon can see, at least one is pinned to the ground by a long spike. The skin is a mottled grey, lumpy and unformed, out of shape like overworked dough. There is no mouth, but its sunken eyes watch them.

Had that been there before? Had they been hiding in the dark with that, thinking they were safe?

Jon tugs on Sam’s elbow, tilting his head towards the figure. It isn’t moving, most likely it can’t move, but Jon doesn’t like the way it watches.

“What?” Sam asks, and Jon makes a shushing motion. Sam’s eyes go wide and he points overdramatically at the figure.

Jon just nods. He glances up towards the store again. He still can’t see her, but there’s a chill settling in again, and he knows she’s close.

He pulls Sam away, around the corner, and when he glances back at the lying figure, a gash opens in its face, pulling apart slowly. They’re out of sight already, but Jon still hears it. It’s a weak noise, a whistling wail that might be a cry for help or an alarm giving them away. It makes his hair stand on end.

The fog turns dark around them, and by the time they reach the bakery it’s hard to see anything.

Jon hesitates then. The back door had been stuck shut. Would it be open now? Would it be better to try the front? Jon had locked the front door as part of his closing shift, but did that really matter here?

He decides to chance it, if only because he can now hear steps behind them, and heaving groans. He pulls hard at the door, expecting it to be locked, and when it opens easily he falls off balance. Sam catches him by the arm and all but pulls him inside. Sam closes and locks the door behind them, as though that might keep them safe.

“You okay?” Sam’s voice shakes.

“Yeah.” Jon raises a hand to his chest. “Let’s just go.”

They hurry towards the back, and Jon hears a sound like rippling water. He glances back just long enough to see the woman reaching through the glass with one arm and then the other, pulling herself through as though lifting herself from a pool.

Jon swears, or thinks he does, he’s not sure the sound leaves his mouth, and turns back. The bakery is so dark next to the street outside, and he walks into a wall on his way to the back. They’re nearly running, and Jon hears Sam trip on the stairs ahead of him. Jon grabs hold of his arm and Sam’s up in seconds, Jon follows him closely.

The air on the stairway shifts, and Jon feels as though he has somehow wandered into something. It feels the way static sounds, and there are small shocks travelling his skin in goosebumps. It’s thick up here, and hard to move, dark in a way that’s almost tangible. Jon reaches out to steady himself against the wall, and it’s soft and alive beneath his fingers. He recoils and tries to hurry up the stairs before it – he doesn’t even know, and he doesn’t want to find out. It’s on memory alone that they make into the office, and Jon pushes the door shut behind them.

Everything is quiet here, and he can no longer hear the heaving groans of the woman behind them. He can’t hear his own harsh breathing, or rapid heartbeat. He would think he were alone if he weren’t holding onto Sam’s arm.

For a moment, he thinks, what if it isn’t Sam he’s holding onto? What if when he lost contact with him on the stairs, he’d grabbed onto something else? It would be an easy way to split them up. It’s not like he can see Sam anyway. His hold loosens, on the edge of letting go, but then the arm turns in his hold and slides their hands together. It makes warmth burst in his chest like sunlight. Yes, that’s Sam. The only one of his friends who would take him by the hand when he was afraid.

Sam tugs him forward, and Jon tries to say, “I don’t know where we are,” but the darkness eats his words.

His feet bump into a dozen things on the way through, and he doesn’t know what any of them are. A box of files, an old metal fan, a severed limb still staked to the floor, a stack of labels, a pinned body whose cries are muffled in the dark, maybe the edge of the desk. He holds Sam’s hand tighter. He doesn’t know if that’s what would happen to them if she were to reach them. Would he be staked to the ground for her to play with while she unmakes him? Or maybe her touch would simply burn him away until he was nothing but the ash that decorated the streets outside.

His heartbeat ratchets up in his chest, and he thinks maybe the silence is inside his head somehow. He has to be making so much noise right now. He half collides with a doorway, and then Sam pulls him up against a table.

And then there’s a light, round and bright on the table. He can see them reflected there, wide eyed and frightened, and that must be the mirror or he’s gone absolutely mad with terror.

Sam’s mouth is moving in the reflection, not that he can hear anything. He doesn’t really know how this will work. Do they just need to touch it? Do they have to climb through it?

He reaches out with their joined hands and brings them to the mirror. It’s cold, and it bends beneath their touch.

For a heartbeat nothing happens. Then it opens before them.

 _Just like Alice_ , he thinks blindly. Sam shifts, and Jon watches the mirror ripple like a pool as Sam climbs into it. It’s a good thing it’s a large mirror, he thinks wildly, as it licks up his arm from where his hand is already inside it. It’s warm. He expected it to be cold, but it isn’t.

He’s already starting to climb in after Sam, only vaguely aware that he might wind up kicking him or landing on his head, when something takes hold of his other arm. It’s cold like ice and it burns his skin. He’s partway inside the mirror and he feels nails dig in, pulling him insistently back. Another hand ghosts up towards his neck, like the hand of a lover, and it’s blindingly painful.

He thinks maybe this is it.

He’s about to find out what she does with the people she’s caught.

There’s a burst of noise, and he realizes it’s the song playing over again, and then Sam pulls his other hand again, and warmth splashes over his chest, a harsh contrast to the cold of her hands. When the hand at the joint of his neck and shoulder comes into contact with the mirror it withdraws immediately as though burned. And then Jon has better leverage, more than halfway through now and he can brace himself on the side he can’t see, and pull.

Her hand on his arm burns though, and he pulls wildly at it, trying to dislodge her grip. He ducks his head through and feels warmth spread through him. He pulls himself through more, until only his arm is left on the other side.

“Sam,” he gasps, and this time he can hear his own voice, raw and strained.

Sam lets go of his hand, and Jon is about to protest when he instead grabs him around the middle and hauls him back. He feels her give, and when her grip reaches the mirror she releases him. He tumbles back, landing on Sam in a heap on the floor.

There’s an angry shriek, and before Jon can think about it, he’s up and grabbing for the sheet next to the mirror. He throws it over, covering up the blackness on the other side.

He turns back to Sam, still sitting on the floor. It’s dark here too, but the normal darkness of a room and not the suffocating blackness they’d been in. This seems almost bright in comparison, no doubt helped by the light in the main part of the office.

He reaches out with a shaky hand and pulls Sam up. “Thank you.”

“Yeah.” Sam breathes.

Jon’s wrist burns, and his neck stings. He rubs at his wrist, and Sam watches him.

He feels empty somehow, adrenaline still pumping through his body, and now there’s nothing but the two of them in the office.

He clears his throat. “Let’s get out of here.”

“God, yes,” Sam says on a wheeze.

They all but flee the back room. In the light of the office, Jon can see long marks curved around his arm. They’re blue-purple, and it hurts to touch. He doesn’t know what to do with it at the moment, but he can still move his arm fine, and he’s pretty sure the first aid kit has nothing that will help him, so he decides to leave it for the moment.

They were mostly done closing, and Jon hates the thought of having to finish his work as much as he hates the thought of leaving it half done to screw over the morning person. He’s been the morning person, it’s not fun. Still. Just get rid of the water buckets and turn off the lights. Easy.

Sam hesitates in the doorway. “I don’t want to come back up here.” He tips his head towards the controls.

“Yeah,” Jon says. “Yeah.”

They turn off the lights and the music, and Jon huddles a little closer to his friend, keeping his phone up. This time, he can see he has full service when he turns his flashlight on. There’s even at least one unread message. It makes him feel a thousand times better.

They stick close when Jon grabs the bucket from the counter. The water inside is ice cold, even though by the clock they are only half an hour behind. Sam takes the mop bucket from its spot by the door when Jon had finished mopping. They pour the water out, and Sam double checks that the back door is locked.

They grab their stuff from the back and sign out. Jon has to throw on his old sweater in addition to his jacket, he can’t seem to get warm. The lights are turned off, and they leave through the front door, and Jon locks it behind them.

He is suddenly infinitely glad that he wasn’t closing alone tonight. It was a rare night that he closed alone, but it had happened before, and he was sure that if he was alone tonight, he never would have made it out.

He turns back towards Sam and sees him fidgeting.

“What was that?” Sam asks.

“I have no idea. I’m just,” Jon shivers, whether from the cold or something else, he doesn’t know. “Glad we got out.”

“Yeah,” Sam says. “Me too.” He hesitates. “Should we tell someone?”

Jon blinks. “Who would we tell? What would we say?” It’s a genuine question. He can’t imagine telling his father about this. Or Edd. Or Mormont. How would he find the words to describe what had happened?

“I don’t know,” Sam says miserably. “It just seems like we should tell someone.”

“Maybe we just ask Mormont to get rid of the mirror?” Jon suggests.

“I guess so,” Sam says. “Can I tell Gilly?”

“I wouldn’t stop you,” Jon says. “It’s not up to me who you tell.” He hadn’t really thought about telling Tormund. That wouldn’t help anything, it would just make him feel better, really.

“Well, I might. I, for one, would very much like to celebrate being alive.” Sam exhales. He pauses, and then pulls Jon into a tight hug.

Jon buries his face in his shoulder and returns it.

“Thank you,” Sam says, and it’s muffled by Jon’s hair. His neck stings where Sam is touching him, but Jon doesn’t care. Sam is a comforting presence right now.

“I didn’t do anything,” Jon says, pulling back. “You saved me. Thank you.”

Sam gives him a grin. “I am a hero, aren’t I?”

Jon’s mouth twists in amusement. “Don’t let it go to your head.”

“Too late,” Sam says. He grows serious. “Make sure there’s someone up for you tonight. I don’t think either of us should be alone.”

“Yeah,” Jon says. And he doesn’t want to be alone, he realizes. He pulls out his phone again, glancing over his messages. There’s one from Theon that simply says ‘Car’, a lovely reminder; one from Sansa asking if he was off yet and telling him she’d taken Ghost out for him, that meant she was up later than she should be with exams coming so soon. He sends her a brief ‘yes’ and a ‘thank you <3’ and then opens a message to Tormund, asking ‘are you still up?’. It isn’t that late, but still, most people Jon knows are in bed already. The responsible ones, anyway.

Sam is watching him type. “Good?”

His phone vibrates with a response from Tormund. ‘I can be’, is the answer. Jon grins. “Yes, good.”

“Call me tomorrow?” Sam asks. Heading towards their cars.

“Yes,” Jon says. He climbs in, and before he closes the door, he says, “Good night, Sam.”

“Night, Jon,” Sam says, as though they didn’t get stuck in a mirror.

It makes something clash in Jon’s stomach. His adrenaline has long since worn off and he feels shaky and weak, but alive in a way he hasn’t felt in a long time. It feels wrong to carry on as though nothing has happened, but what else can he do? Run through the streets yelling about a parallel reality? Tell his baby brothers that monsters are real? Burn down the bakery? Cry himself to sleep? Smash the mirror into a thousand tiny bits? Go and throw himself at Tormund?

He does like the sound of those last two. But the mirror will have to wait. Right now he just wants someone that makes him feel safe.

In the privacy of his own car, he sends Tormund, ‘can I come over?’ He bites his lip. They don’t usually do things like this in the middle of the week, but it’s not like either of them said they couldn’t. He thinks about having to go home alone. Ghost would go up to bed with him, it would be something at least, although Jon can’t imagine sleeping tonight. Not alone. And that’s not Ghost’s fault.

A reply comes a moment later. ‘Course. Bringing your car?’

‘Just off work. Taking car back for Theon, then I’ll come by.’

‘Walking alone at midnight? You’ll be accosted.’

‘There are worse things.’ Jon types, then frowns at his phone. He’s vaguely aware of Sam pulling away from the curb and driving off. He looks up at the bakery. It’s dark inside, as it should be. But it still makes him shiver. He sticks his phone in the cupholder and starts the car. He hears it buzz once, and then again moments later, but it’s a short ride home and it can wait.

Only once he’s parked and made his way to the front door does he check to see what Tormund has sent.

‘Do you want me to pick you up?’ and then a few moments later, ‘I’m coming to your house. Don’t walk.’

Jon smiles at his phone. He slips inside quietly, tosses his work bag on his chair and sneaks upstairs to grab some clean clothes, toothbrush, deodorant, hairbrush, and toss them in a bag. He stops to kiss Ghost on the head and ruffle Grey Wind and Lady’s fur, and then his phone goes off again.

‘Outside now. Move your ass.’

He kisses Ghost again, bumping their heads together and then hurries back out.

Tormund is waiting outside in his truck, and the sight of him is infinitely more comforting than anything else. Jon locks the door behind him and hurries to the passenger side, climbing up into the cab.

“You didn’t have to drive over,” he says by way of greeting.

Tormund is wearing sweat pants and a jacket, looking like he was already heading for bed when he left.

He grunts at Jon. “Sure I did. Otherwise you might have changed your mind.”

Jon laughs, and it doesn’t sound quite right. “I wouldn’t have, believe me.” Although he is incredibly glad he doesn’t have to walk through the dark streets again.

Tormund gives him a strange look, putting his truck in gear and pulling out of the lot. “Bad day?”

“You have no idea,” Jon says, and this time he can hear the hysteria bordering the edges of his voice.

“All right then.” Tormund’s voice is soothing. “It’s over now.”

That makes tears prick in the corners of his eyes, and his face grows hot. “Don’t say that,” Jon protests.

“What d’ye want me to say then?” Tormund asks.

“Just… You don’t have to say anything. Just be here,” Jon says.

It’s a short drive back to Tormund’s, and they spend the rest in silence. Jon turns the radio on when the silence presses too close. He doesn’t recognize the song playing, and he turns it back off.

Once they’re inside, Jon latches on to Tormund and lets the larger man huddle him against the door. That’s what he wanted. Like this, he feels safe.

He might not get much sleep tonight, but at least it won’t be because of nightmares.

\---

Jon steps out the shower, dripping wet and comfortably warm. The marks on his arm are stark against his skin, and there’s a smaller, lighter one at his neck. Tormund had said they looked like frostbite, but they are unmistakably finger marks. It had taken a while for them to stop burning, and they still sting lightly, but it’s easier to ignore now. He’ll put more ointment on them when his skin is dry.

Now, he is relaxed, and his skin is littered with enough marks to make him forget the ones he didn’t want. He is sore in the very best way and reasonably sure his shower didn’t really get him any cleaner.

“I want to tell them,” Jon says.

“What?” Tormund asks. He stops the water behind him, and Jon tosses him a towel before getting one for himself.

“About us. I want to tell them,” Jon says. “My father, your daughters. My siblings.”

The bathroom is thick with steam, and out of the corner of his eyes he can see the mirror is fogged over. He runs the towel over his hair and then wraps it around his waist, turning to wipe the mirror.

He pauses, one hand raised. He entirely misses what Tormund is saying behind him.

On the mirror are two perfect long-fingered clean handprints, as though someone had leaned against a window.

He frowns at it, a chill running up his spine. It’s not from his hands, and the fingers are too thin to be Tormund’s.

They are long, and Jon is sure that if he could straighten the mark on his arm it would match that handprint on the mirror.

He stares, momentarily horrified by the implications of that hand.

Tormund wraps an arm around his waist and pulls him so Jon’s back is flush against his chest, leaning in to press his mouth to Jon’s neck where it is suddenly burning like ice.

Jon’s hand curls into a useless fist. He’s afraid to touch the mirror now. Was she watching him? He flushes hot at the thought. Is she there now? If he were to clear the steam would he see her face behind him? If he touched the mirror, could she haul him back through?

“Where’d you go?” Tormund asks, voice right in his ear. “Did you hear me?”

Jon swallows. He hasn’t told Tormund anything yet. He couldn’t bring himself to at first, and then they’d been a little busy for that.

“I –”

Tormund reaches up to clear the mirror. Jon shuts his eyes tightly.

He feels Tormund’s hand come back to rest on his chest, over his heart. “Jon?”

He opens his eyes. There’s nothing in the mirror but himself, looking pale and a little frightened, and Tormund wrapped around him. He exhales harshly.

Tormund spins him around so his back rests against the counter. “You change your mind already?”

Jon blinks at him. “No. It’s – What did you say?” he glances back over his shoulder at the mirror. Tormund takes him under the chin and turns him back.

“I said I’d be glad to tell them,” Tormund says. He presses closer. “I want the whole world to know you’re mine.”

That makes Jon flush, and it pushes away the nagging worry for a moment. “Oh. Good.”

“Now you tell me why you’ve been shaking like a leaf and holding onto me like a drowning man all night,” Tormund says, and his voice is firm but kind.

Jon sighs. “I don’t even know how to start.” He rubs at his arm where it is burning again.

He really is going to have to get rid of that mirror isn’t he? But at least he’s pretty sure Tormund will help him. And Sam.

Sam! Oh yes, he was supposed to call him. And he didn’t really tell anyone he would be out for the night… He probably has a dozen missed calls and some annoyed messages from his siblings and – Tormund silences the stampede of thoughts with a kiss.

Maybe that can wait.

**Author's Note:**

> Anyone looking for the songs that go with the lyrics mentioned in here: the interrupted song is "Tongue Tied" by Group Love. And the ghostie song is "The Memory of You" from the Remothered: Tormented Fathers soundtrack. I weirdly like that song, and it makes for some good creepy atmosphere.


End file.
